Did The ATF Try To Cover Up Ties To The Murder Of A U.S. Border Patrol Agent?

Flickr Jim Greenhill
A Congressional investigation into the Justice Department's botched gunrunning program has uncovered evidence that the U.S. Attorney's office in Arizona may have tried to cover up its connection to the death of U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry.

In a letter sent on Thursday to the Arizona U.S. Attorney, Congressional investigators say the office's Assistant Attorney, Emory Hurley, learned almost immediately that guns found at the scene of Terry's murder had been purchased through the gunrunning program, known as Operation Fast and Furious, under which ATF agents in Phoenix allowed more than 2,000 guns to "walk" across the border to Mexico.

According to the letter, communications between Hurley and ATF supervisors in the hours after Terry's death "both contemplated the connection between the two cases and sought to prevent the connection from being disclosed."

Although the "straw buyer" who illegally purchased the guns was arrested within hours, an internal email between ATF supervisors David Voth and William Newell reveals that the initial charges were unrelated to the purchase so as not to "divulge our current case (Fast&Furious) or the Border Patrol shooting case."

Another email says that Hurley agreed with the decision not to reveal the connection "so as not to complicate the FBI's investigation" into Terry's death.

Even after ATF whistleblowers revealed the connection earlier this year, sparking the Congressional investigation and an internal DOJ probe, Hurley filed a motion in opposition to the Terry family's victims' rights claim on the grounds that the gun purchase was "too factually and temporally attenuated from the murder — if connected at all."

The Arizona U.S. Attorney's office announced earlier this week that Hurley has been reassigned to the office's civil division. Newell and Voth have also been reassigned to jobs at ATF headquarters in Washington. Arizona U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke resigned this week, and Acting ATF Director Kenneth Melson has also stepped down.

The congressional investigation, led by House Oversight Chair Darrell Issa (R-CA) and U.S. Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA) is now examining who in the Obama administration knew about and authorized Fast and Furious, and whether other agencies were involved in the program.

Emails obtained by the LA Times yesterday indicate that at least three White House national security officials had some knowledge of Fast and Furious.